August 1, 2008

I'm watching CNN and there is a report about the Republicans in Washington pulling a big stunt about drilling for oil. When the report ends, there is a commercial from the oil industry about why the country needs to drill for more oil.

It doesn't get much clearer than that. This is a political party involving itself in a corporate product marketing campaign, for money. This "drill now" campaign is funded by oil companies, and is about giving them even more special government favors. It isn't a lot different from changing a stadium's name to "Enron Stadium" or Pac Bell park" etc.

This political campaign is in conjunction with an oil industry PR campaign to try to get the government to hand them even more drilling leases than the millions of acres they already have (and sit on without drilling). It came just as oil prices peaked and suggests that oil prices peaked in order to prime the public for this campaign.

We have seen this before, involving Republican coordination with tobacco companies... It is very much like a consumer product launch marketing campaign.

Posted by Dave Johnson at August 1, 2008 12:54 PM

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Comments

Dave, this has been obvious for a long time. But not all oil companies are the same. Foreign owned ones are more open to nuance and bipartisan conditions...but MobilExxon is totally in the Republican camp. They've been TexasConservativeRightWing for a long time (since the 70s) while bankrolling right wing think tanks, politicians, global warming denialists, antiEnviromentalists, etc.

I suggest going just about any other gas station than the ubiquious Exxon (mobil) stations. There has been a mild boycott. But Democrats need to own up to the Republican's ties to Big Oil. Unfortunately as we know, people like Al Gore have connections in the past too. And just about anyone with any investments probably are cashing in on the one good paying sector of investments now: Energy and Oil.

So it's more like Class Warfare from both wealthy Repugs... and a good number of Dems too who are enjoying their Oil investments at the expense of a declining working class and middle class.

Obama's backing off from this fact is going to take a toll. He needs to stay on a left populist course if he wants to win this.

I remember Dukakis all to well when he turned Right ward at this point in the campaign frittering away a double digit lead over Bush 1. Obama needs to mention fatcat Republican oil executives from now on and not give quarter as he seems to be doing with bending to the wishes of the oil lobby.